by the presidential debate and the whole issue of what happened in benghazi on september 11th, what i call the myth of libya's ire -- ire veal -- irrelevance of u.s. policy. go back to the libyan's fate, one, the u.s. relations with lip ya has been, you know, u.s. has always looked at libya as something of a strange creature that we could use for certain -- as a piece, of a strategy that had to do with the region as a whole. it was never looked at -- it was never seen as an object in and of itself. could start with the relation of the soviets, the eisenhower doctrine, and the united states' desire to push back soviet influence. libya was desperately pleading for u.s. attention back then, for aid, to get itself together, to stand on its own feet. this was before the discovery of oil, and the u.s. took a, well, you know, you're not really important as e just a minute, for example, and, you know, we'll think about it, and the result was that the prime minister of the time, you know, basically devised a plan to court the soviets and see if he could grab the united states' attention, and that happened.
